


Act Your Age

by lindsey_grissom



Series: Crystal Heart [7]
Category: Doctor Who (2005), Torchwood
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crossover, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-12
Updated: 2010-01-12
Packaged: 2017-10-10 14:59:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/101039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lindsey_grissom/pseuds/lindsey_grissom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Commodore Jeffries has said that if you look into the blue eyes there is something not quite right there.</i>  Part of the <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/series/3978">Crystal Heart</a> 'Verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Act Your Age

Cadet Harkness, Third Division, Time Agent in training. There is something distant about the young man. It is not blatantly obvious and the winning smiles and easy humour do seem genuine. But Commodore Jeffries has said that if you look into the blue eyes there is something not quite right there.

He hasn't seen it himself and not for the first time he wonders if maybe it was someone else they meant. He hadn't overheard the whole conversation after all.

Jack has always been playful for as long as he has known him. He isn't open with information about his past, but he knows the younger man has seen the darkest sides of war. That much had been whispered in the corridors of the Agency and it was always there when others spoke to him of the thrill of fighting. He didn't have quite the same enthusiasm.

He had thought, at first, that the new recruit was a middle-aged man. The Lithnians accredited their win partially to a fighter by the name of Jack Harkness, they are very secretive of the last weeks of their war, but that they had made known. So surely Jack Harkness was an older man. Nothing could have prepared him for the Jack he now knows. Barely out of childhood, to look at, at least. Because he does know that those eyes do not belong to any child. Maybe that is what the Commodore meant.

They have shared quarters for almost a year now and he has never seen even the slightest change in the demeanour of his roommate. If the fun loving, 'everything-for-a-laugh' Jack Harkness is an act, then it is a flawless production.

Even now the younger man is busy retelling a tale of their latest training mission, thunderous laughter rising from the circle of men and women sitting around them. He tries to look into Jack's eyes, to see what Jeffries sees, but finds only humour sparkling there.

"And then Freyas here turns to me and says; 'That's one way to take out the trash Harkness, but next time open the window first.'" He laughs with the others as Jack's arm comes around to circle his shoulders; a casual gesture he has received more times than he can count.

The human is far more physical than any of his own kind. They don't look any different and many of the other Trainees regularly mistake him for a descendant of Earth, but he isn't Human and Jack knows that. It doesn't seem to faze him though, if anything he thinks it makes Jack more affectionate towards him.

The women are practically hanging over the accented man, the men only just holding themselves back from the same and he can't help but wonder what it is that Jack has that attracts so many to him. He really would like to know, because it drew him in too. Just one smile, a broad greeting; _'Jack Harkness'_ and his own 'Gregori Freyas' had come out as a stammering mess.

No Jack has no shortage of admirers and Gregori knows just how many of them become lovers.   
After a year he also knows which ones Jack will go home with at the end of a late night. He doesn't like to think about how much time he has spent focussed on Jack's conquests.

If a training mission has gone well, Jack will find a tall blonde, sex and species are irrelevant. If it has just been a day of lessons and paperwork he will look for something a bit more fun, red heads if there is more than one interested, or a non-humanoid species.

On a day where a mission has failed, where if it had been more than training, lives would have been lost, Jack finds him and they spend the night in a corner of the bar. HyperVodkas on continuous supply and the younger man will just sit and listen while he talks about his home planet and his family. There are fewer jokes on those nights and the smiles seem a little sadder, but even then he hasn't been able to find anything hidden in Jack's eyes.

He likes those evenings most, though he knows he shouldn't. Jack is ten years younger than him, but he finds it is easy to forget that sometimes.

A soft touch to his hand draws him back from his thoughts, and he knows that any moment now Jack will announce his departure and that of the blonde haired Bryan on his arm. However, Jack hasn't pulled on his jacket, and the bar seems rather empty. Just how long has he sat here thinking?

"How are you doing Greg? You sort of spaced out there." Ah, so the soft touch was Jack. Why hasn't he moved his hand back yet?

"My thoughts were on the past Jack, I am afraid I could almost get lost there most days."  
He flashes what he hopes is a wry smile and tries to ignore the heat radiating from his hand.

"Gotta keep to the present, my friend. That's what I always say."

"You are too young for an always statement. You are but a child." He thinks he means it as a joke, but it should be true, so very true.

Jack's smile drops and he finally glimpses that _something_ the Commodore spoke of.

But he was wrong, it isn't distance. It's a haunting sliver of something he has never felt himself and as such could never name.

"I've never been a child Gregori." There is a slight pause and then the smile returns with the words, eyes sparkling brightly again. "Come on, lets go back to our place and I'll show you how grown up I am." He winks, beckoning him seductively and as Jack rises from the table he realises that tonight Jack has chosen him.

He really needs to re-calculate Jack's dating system. Later. Maybe now is the time for some hands on research.

 

**End.**


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